


Aftershocks

by Xanthos_Samurai



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Exes, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Nightmares, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-17
Updated: 2021-01-17
Packaged: 2021-03-15 18:49:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28818060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xanthos_Samurai/pseuds/Xanthos_Samurai
Summary: When Clark tries to comfort Bruce after a nightmare, Bruce calls him by someone else's name.
Relationships: Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne, Harvey Dent/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 12
Kudos: 109





	Aftershocks

**Author's Note:**

> I love Harvey/Bruce and I love Bruce/Clark and I love the idea that Bruce loves them both and is messed up about it.
> 
> Straight up sad fic is not usually my forte, so this is a bit different for me. I hope you enjoy!
> 
> (As always, thank you for Orphean for support, beta suggestions, comments, and general awesomeness.)

Like an animal sensing a tremor in the earth before an earthquake hits, Clark feels the attack coming before it happens. He doesn’t know how he knows. It stems from the mind, not the body, and Clark knows that he isn’t psychic. But the thousand tiny physiological signs that accompany it, these are things that someone with Clark’s senses can feel almost before they happen.

The sudden sharp increase in Bruce’s heart rate is loud enough to wake Clark from sleep, loud enough to sound like someone pounding on a door. The smell of the fear in Bruce’s sweat fills his nose. Bruce’s body goes rigid, straining. Whether he’s straining towards or away from something, Clark can never tell. A whimper escapes his constricted throat and his face goes pale, the blood draining from the sight of whatever a man like Bruce Wayne would see in his nightmares. 

“Bruce?” Clark whispers, sliding a hand across his lover’s chest to rest over his pounding heart. Bruce is dangerous like this, like a wounded, frightened animal. “Bruce, you’re dreaming…”

Bruce’s eyes fly open with a gasp, but they’re empty and unseeing, just blank blue. He struggles away from Clark’s touch, lashing out with movements that are less coordinated than the fighting style he employs when awake, but no less effective. His breathing is ragged as he hurls knees and elbows and hands at Clark, trying to drive him off. His curled fist smashes into Clark’s nose. It doesn’t feel good, but it also doesn’t _hurt_ Clark like it would hurt a human being. He can tell from the force of the impact and the fact that Bruce’s knuckles were already starting to swell that the force of the impact would have broken his nose and maybe more. If he hadn’t been Superman.

Clark draws back as Bruce presses himself against the headboard, eyes still wide, chest still heaving, every muscle in his body drawn so taut that he might snap at any second. The desire to wrap himself around Bruce and hold him until he feels the tension drain away is overwhelming, but Clark forces himself to wait. Bruce can’t hurt _him_ in this state, but he can easily hurt himself trying to get away. 

“Bruce…” He keeps his voice soft and low and calm, the voice he used for frightened animals on the farm. “It was a nightmare, baby. It’s not real. You’re here with me, okay? You aren’t there.”

He says “there” because he has no idea where Bruce’s mind thinks he is, and there are too many possibilities to guess. Is he on a rooftop watching the city below him burn to ashes and blood? Is he on a distant planet, forced to hurt innocents and his own teammates while trapped within his mind? Is he cradling Jason’s broken body in the rubble? Is he back in the alley with his parents, watching powerless as they fall?

It could be any of them. It could be all of them. And Clark will never know.

All he can do is pray that his words reach Bruce in whatever darkness he’s in.

Bruce blinks once. HIs eyes are still blank, but some of the tension falls from his shoulders, little by little. And then all at once he’s slumping, limp and spent and shaking. Clark reaches for him then, and Bruce allows himself to be gathered up like a frightened child. A thin sheen of sweat covers Bruce’s bare skin, but Clark doesn’t care as he settles Bruce in his lap, holding him securely. All he cares about is how hard Bruce’s heart is still beating.

“I’m sorry…” Bruce mumbles, his words hardly intelligible because of how badly he’s shaking. He presses himself against Clark’s chest as though he’s cold and seeking warmth. “I’m so sorry, Harvey... Are you okay?”

Harvey. _Harvey._

Bruce calls him Harvey. He’s never done that before. 

A slick, cold feeling curls itself in Clark’s gut, but he tries to ignore it. _Bruce isn’t awake,_ he tells himself. _He isn’t himself. He doesn’t know where he is. But he knows you’re safe and that’s why he’s holding onto you. He knows he cares about you or else he wouldn’t be concerned. That’s what matters now._

But Bruce doesn’t know who he is. Or he thinks he’s someone else.

Clark holds him, rocking back and forth a little like Ma did when he’d woken up from nightmares. He extricates Bruce’s hand from between their bodies. It’s hot and swollen from smashing into Clark’s face, but it doesn’t feel like anything’s broken. Clark brings it to his lips and blows, so his cooling breath can soothe the worst of the pain. 

He does this often when Bruce is hurt. It doesn’t accelerate the healing, but it does help Bruce hurt less. And it’s something that only Clark can do. He tries not to think about how desperately he wants Bruce to look up at him with recognition in his eyes and call him by his name.

That’s not what’s important right now, he wants to tell himself. What’s important is helping Bruce.

And yet...

“You’re okay,” he reassures Bruce. “And I’m okay, I promise. You didn’t hurt me. You can’t hurt me, remember?”

It wasn’t a lie, Bruce really hadn’t hurt him. Though not for lack of trying. 

Bruce swallows hard and closes his eyes. He’s still shaking, but it’s less frequent now, coming in waves like aftershocks. 

“Do you think you can go back to sleep if I hold you? You need to get some rest.” Clark bows his head and kisses Bruce’s hair. 

“Don’t leave.” 

“I’m not going anywhere, Bruce. I promise.”

They fall into silence. Clark holds him and waits a long time as Bruce’s heart slows, slows, slows, and then, finally, settles into sleep.

Clark says awake, listening to him, feeling cold and sick and empty, glad for once that he can only hear his lover’s breath and blood and not his thoughts.

That way at least he can try to convince himself that his arms are the ones in which Bruce sought solace. 

* * *

Bruce is aware of three things immediately upon waking. 

The first is the dull, aching throb in his right hand. The second is that his whole body is sore, like he’s been in a fight that he doesn’t remember. The third is that Clark is wrapped around him, awake and waiting for him to wake up too.

“Bruce?”

Clark whispers as Bruce blinks into full wakefulness. A warm hand touches Bruce’s shoulder, tentative. 

“I’m awake.” Bruce’s voice is hoarse. 

“How do you feel?” 

“Terrible.” 

Bruce is about to ask the question, about to ask why he feels this way, and he remembers. He remembers the nightmare, remembers fighting to get away, remembers the impact of his hand on something that felt like a block of stone. He remembers being held. It’s all only snatches of memory, feelings and flashes, but it’s enough.

He pushes away from Clark just enough to be able to turn and look at him. His eyes go immediately to Clark’s face, checking for signs of injury even though he knows that he can’t hurt him. Clark’s face is as perfect as it always is, not a blemish or a scar. He watches Bruce with something almost like sadness in his eyes.

“You didn’t hurt me,” Clark reassures him. “But you hurt your hand. How does it feel?”

“I _tried_ to hurt you.” Bruce pushes away and sits up. He drags his hands up his face, then claws his fingers through his hair, pushing it back. “I tried to kill you in my sleep. Again. Because I had a fucking nightmare.”

“It’s not your fault, Bruce.” Clark sits up too and watches him with concern. His hand, heavy and warm, finds its favorite spot on Bruce’s thigh, just below the crease of the hip. “And you didn’t actually hurt me. It’s okay.”

“It’s _not_ okay.” 

It comes out as a snarl, more vehement than Bruce intends. He’s lucky he’s with Clark, lucky he’s with a man who he can’t actually murder by accident in bed. But luck frightens Bruce. Luck isn’t good enough. 

Clark is silent, and in that silence he withdraws his hand from Bruce’s leg. Bruce wonders if maybe he finally understands. If this is the incident that’s finally going to make Clark see him the way he sees himself, as dangerous. As unworthy.

“You called me Harvey.”

The name is a punch to the gut. 

Bruce turns to Clark and Clark is looking right at him, crossed legs still covered by the blanket, his hands in his lap. He doesn’t look angry. He doesn’t look defensive. He doesn’t even look sad. Bruce doesn’t know which is worse.

“Fuck.” Bruce’s voice is almost inaudible. “I’m sorry, Clark.”  
  
“You weren’t really you. I understand.”

The understanding and acceptance in Clark’s voice hurts almost more than anything else. Just once Bruce almost wishes he would be selfish, be angry. Bruce doesn’t know what to say to such instantaneous forgiveness so he says nothing. Clark may forgive him, but he knows there must be more on his mind.

The silence between them stretches for a long moment before Clark breaks it again.

“I know that you two were together before… he changed. You’ve never talked about it.”

Bruce nods.

“Did you love him?”

“Yes. Very much.”

“Do…” This next question is difficult for Clark to ask, Bruce can hear it in his voice. ”Do you still?”

“I love him now for who he was when I loved him.” 

The answer probably doesn’t make sense, but Bruce can’t elaborate any further. He doesn’t have the words for it, and he doesn’t have the energy to try. But Clark nods.

“I want you to tell me about him. About how you were.”

Bruce’s eyes snap over to him, frowning. “I don’t think now’s the time for that, Clark.” 

“You thought I was him. You called out for him in your sleep. I think now is the perfect time.”

If Clark had demanded or been angry or been anything other than himself, soft and concerned and open, Bruce would refuse. But Clark _is_ himself, and Bruce finds himself talking before he even realizes it.

“I was young when we were together. Just barely Batman. The nightmares were more frequent back then. I hurt him badly a few times.” Bruce pauses to breathe, shocked and amazed that he’s said even this much. He hasn’t talked about Harvey in years. He looks down at his hands. “I’ve never stopped feeling guilty for it. I would wake up the next morning and he’d be there with ice on his eye, but he would ask me if _I_ was okay.”

Clark stays silent as Bruce speaks, letting him say what he needs to say and feel what he needs to feel. 

“Harvey was… he always put other people first. When we were together, he always put me first. And I took advantage of that. After the first time I hurt him, I should have insisted we shouldn’t share a bed so that it wouldn’t happen again. But I didn’t. I let myself hurt him because I wanted him.”

“It was his choice to make too, Bruce.” Clark’s hand is a comforting weight on Bruce’s thigh. “He could have chosen to remove himself and he didn’t.”

“I know.” Bruce rests his hand over Clark’s hand without even realizing it. “It was my fault we ended. It was months before he became Two-Face. I just… let him slip away. He loved me and I let him slip away.”

“I’m not slipping away, Bruce. No matter what, I’ll always be here.” 

Bruce leans into him and allows Clark to hold him, to comfort him. He murmurs Clark’s name over and over to reassure him and reassure himself. Clark is here. Clark is the one he wants. Clark is the one he loves. 

What he doesn’t tell Clark was how similar he and Harvey were… how often Clark’s certainty and his belief in right and wrong and his determination to put others first makes him think of Harvey and how he used to be, back when he was the same kind of bright beacon that Clark is, an example of how men can be better. Both of them were that light, that beacon, that example. 

And that’s why Bruce knows that he doesn’t deserve to be with either one. 

A destructive force like him can ultimately only hurt or abandon others. He had already allowed Harvey to slip away, and then Harvey had been broken, shattered into shards that only vaguely resembled the man he loved. And now he can feel a crack in the foundation of himself and Clark, a tiny fissure that had appeared the second that he’d called Harvey’s name into the dark.

And now it’s only a matter of time before it breaks, and Clark slips away from him forever too.


End file.
